The Blindfold (1992)

In The Blinfold, Columbia grad student Iris Vegan, hired by a writer to record taped descriptions of the belongings of a murdered woman, enters into a voyeuristic mystery she can't untangle. When a photographer makes her a minor celebrity by circulating a disturbing portrait he took of her, she feels defiled. After cross-dressing for a Halloween party, she frequents after-hours bars in drag, fighting off inexplicably violent impulses. One lover leaves her; another treats her like an ethics experiment. Hustvedt has dipped into a heap of philosophic classics and digested them well. The Blindfold is deep, dark, and drenched in the paranoia of the information age. A